Sunday, January 19, 2014

12 Years a Slave

12
Years a Slave

2013

Director:
Steve McQueen

Starring:
Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Lupita Nyong’o

There
is something very un-Hollywood about Steve McQueen, and god bless for that. In
the hands of a typical director, 12 Years a Slave would be precisely
the sort of film that I would feel morally obligated to see, appeasing a deep
seated sense of American guilt. It would feel like something I had to see,
vegetables that accompany my dinner, something rather difficult to swallow yet
somehow knowing that it is quote-good for me-unquote. But Steve McQueen is not
a typical director, and what could have been a massively heavy handed and
overtly melodramatic tale of slavery in the South is instead quiet, even subtle
(rarely a word used to describe slavery-slash-Civil War films), but not for a
moment lacking the power and anger the subject matter demands.

Based
on a true story, Solomon Northup (Ejiofor) is a free black man living in
Saratoga, New York, in the early 1840s.
He has a wife and two children and a very well-to-do life; that is,
until he is kidnapped and sold into slavery in the American South and given the
new name of Platt. Passed around from
slave auctioneer to foresting plantation to sugar plantation to a particularly
brutal cotton plantation run by the brutal Master Epps (Fassbender), he learns
that in order to survive, he must keep his head down and his mouth shut. Were word to come to his new masters that he
can read and write, he would certainly be killed.

And
although I often try not to discuss the ending of a film when I review it, I *will*
be mentioning a bit more about the plot than normal, so fair spoiler warning.

The only other film of McQueen’s that I've seen is Shame, and that was a
rare film that earned a "perfect" score of ten out of ten on its
first go around. I tend not to give films perfect scores after a first viewing;
perfect scores are for films that have cultivated a place in my heart, films
that I have cherished for a long time. It's not that I don't think new films
are good, it's more recognizing the importance of longevity. Shame,
on the other hand, demanded I throw that system out the window, so resounding
was its power. I mention this because it’s an exception I rarely make, and
McQueen, with that film, earned my respect and then some.

I was not entirely interested in seeing 12 Years a Slave originally (even
despite the immense ovary-exploding draws of Benedict Cumberbatch and Michael Fassbender
combined) because of aforementioned sense of "chore." Powerful,
undoubtedly, but chore nonetheless. Then I saw that McQueen directed it. And
then I was much more interested.

I could not reconcile in my head how a director whose only work I had seen had
been a small scale character study, a work that was all about the emotionally
damaged lives of two broken people, a film shot with a devotion to long,
uncomfortably quiet takes, could take on a period piece about slavery.

And indeed, McQueen delivers as atypical a piece on American slavery as I could
possibly imagine. What McQueen does in
this film is essentially remove any sort of trope or expectation I associate
with "slavery film," while still making a film about slavery. It’s not at all the heavy-handed morality
play with swells in plot and soundtrack that are as predictable as dammit. Thank god. And just like Shame, there are long,
unbroken takes. Many dialogue sequences are shot in one take, interrupting
infrequently, somehow allowing the characters to finish their thoughts. There
are a myriad of slow, lingering shots of trees, of swampland, of the sky. The
most memorable moment was a quiet close up on Ejiofor towards the end of the
film. He speaks no words, simply turns his face towards the camera. The shot is
easily thirty seconds long. Does it further the plot in an obvious way? Not in
the slightest. But it's a hugely important shot, angry in its quiet, and
reminding us that Solomon's life is not at peace, that everything is wrong,
that although Solomon has "learned" how to survive, although we have
not heard him mention his wife and children since the opening of the film, he has not for a second forgotten them. We don't need an expository scene of Solomon explaining how much he misses his former life, not when an infinitely more lyrical close up will do the trick.

Gratuitous photo of Benedict Cumberbatch. Because reasons.

What is also refreshing in 12 Years a Slave is, similar to
above, not all characters are pure good or pure evil (a very typical approach
when making slavery films and war films alike). There is Master Ford the
plantation owner (played by a dreamy Benedict Cumberbatch) who is clearly
compassionate but seems unwilling to stick his neck out too far. There is the
hard plantation contractor who unexpectedly saves Solomon from a hanging, but
then doesn't cut him down, leaving him tied and bound for hours. The white man
who ultimately ventures to the south to reclaim Solomon's freedom is portrayed
as shady. Yes, there are a few ancillary characters who are allowed to be
one-dimensional, but nearly anyone with more than two scenes is given an unexpected
depth.

The
performances are top-notch. Nominated
for three acting Oscars for Ejiofor, Fassbender, and Nyong’o as cotton plantation
slave Patsey, everyone is strong.
Ejiofor carries the film with a heavy heart, Nyong’o shines playing a
character full of strength and spirit who has been depressingly beaten down,
but for my money, Fassbender steals every scene he’s in. His Epps is insane in a way not often
shown. Clearly the film’s main
antagonist, Epps is the “Evil Plantation Owner.” What’s interesting is that Epps is mad, mad
with brutality and sexual obsession, but only a little mad. He’s a “believable” mad. I can see how society would let someone like
this exist, would let them get on with their lives, would even allow them to
come to some prominence because they have money. Fassbender is not off the deep end, but he’s
about waist-deep and slowly wading his way over. It’s a very good restrained evil genius.

One of the most interesting aspects of 12 Years a Slave is the theme of
guilt, a theme also heavily examined in Shame. We watch Solomon make several
choices in the film that are ugly choices but born of necessity. In an early
instance, another black woman who has been kidnapped into slavery is sold,
while her young children remain to be sold to different owners. Rather than
fight to help the mother stay with her children, Solomon takes up a violin and
starts playing a jaunty tune in an attempt to drown out the wails. It is this
that Ejiofor portrays so painfully well, this sensation of being driven to
horrible acts of compliance in order to not be killed and how it eats away at
his soul. When the film hits its climax, where Solomon is finally rescued by
his friends from the North, there is more of a focus on his abandonment of
Patsey and the other slaves on Epps’ plantation rather than the joy or triumph
at his wrong being righted. Really, this
is what makes this film so fascinating to me. There is no triumphant finale
where Solomon cheerfully returns to his home. How can there be? What he has
gone through has eaten at his very humanity, least of all because of the hard
labor. Although the film certainly celebrates his ultimate return to freedom,
it is utterly lacking in pomp. Indeed, Solomon asks for forgiveness upon his
return. Forgiveness. The guilt at not always helping, at sometimes turning a
blind eye, at abandoning the others on the plantation... Of course he is
grateful for his newfound freedom, but this film recognizes that one man’s
success is hardly a significant win for making real progress on the issue.

There
is still a slight sense of “eating my vegetables” while watching 12
Years a Slave, but it is mostly kept at bay. Smart directing choices by McQueen and
standout performances from the cast turn what could have been a meat-fisted
over-the-top guilt-fest melodrama into something far more potent, powerful, and
inexplicably subtle. I’m pleased that
such a complex film is getting the level of attention being heaped on it during
this current awards season.

That's a good question, and probably the most common one I've gotten when I've talked to people about this movie. My answer is: it wasn't nearly as violent/gory as I *thought* it would be. This movie is NOT like Tarantino. There is *some* explicit violence, but not nearly as much as I've "gotten used to" with other films. In terms of what is actually shown versus what is implied but not REALLY shown, the film veers far more to the latter. I can think of two scenes where someone is being whipped where, for a moment, you actually see the flesh tear, but it's far more common in this film to have it LOOK like someone is being whipped but you're not actually seeing the whip come into contact with the person in question.

I'm a massive wimp when it comes to blood and gore, and there was only one tiny moment when I had to close my eyes.

Having said all of that, damn hell it doesn't necessarily make those scenes easier to watch just because I'm not actually seeing the violence happen. It's a hard film, any way you cut it. But it's not gruesome.

I didn't read this until now because I wanted to write my review without possibly cribbing from you. (I just posted it.) We did touch on some of the same topics, especially how there are gradiations in the portrayals of characters and that this is a more measured kind of film. We also touched on how Northrup is not the "valiant hero" nobly standing up to his captors. There's no "I shall avenge you" or even "I will return for you" speeches when he gets his freedom. It's just "Sorry, gotta go. Gonna miss you." That made it more realistic.

You liked this a little more than I did, but we are not as far apart on this as we were on Shame.

I am amused that one of the critics' major "problems" with this movie is that it's "anti-climactic." It's as if they expected some big ole SAVE THE DAY FOR SLAVES, WHITE PEOPLE! triumphal ending that just plain doesn't belong. What triumph does Northup really have?